Diary of a Wimpy Kid

Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Last Straw
Written and Illustrated by Jeff Kinney
Publisher:Amulet Books
January, 2009
Grade:5-8
Themes:  peer acceptance, humor and family

Summary: This book is part of the Diary of the Wimpy Kid series. Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Last Straw is about a typical middle school age boy who writes in his journal everyday about embarrassing moments, sibling rivalry, crushes, friends and his relationship with his family. He tries to impress people all around him. He is not an honors student and is not very athletic. He tries to fit in at school and occasionally gets in trouble. He wants to please his father because his father has threatened to send him to boarding school.

Reflection: This book is so funny! I think middle school students could relate to it and would enjoy it. I couldn't put it down. I liked that it was written from a child's point of view. It brought me back to when I was in middle school. The themes such as peer acceptance, sibling rivalry and embarrassing moments are all apart of typical middle age student's lives. For boys who don't typically enjoy reading will really like this book.

Pre-Reading: Discuss what a graphic novel is and the different parts of graphic novels. Look at all the illustrations and discuss how they create meaning.

Post-Reading: The students will create their own graphic novels. They will use the same format as the book, comic strips. They can make a comic strip about any topic they would like. They need to brainstorm in their journals before creating their graphic novel.

About the author:

Jeff Kinney was born in Maryland in 1971 and attended the University of Maryland. He knew he wanted to be a cartoonist. He worked on Diary of a Wimpy Kid for a long time before it was finally released in 2007. Diary of a Wimpy Kid was a New York Times best seller along with the other books in the series. Jeff is a full-time design director of a Boston-based Internet Publishing Company. Jeff lives in Massachusetts with his wife and two sons.